In a new blog post, Janice Hardy identifies three common mistakes writers make when creating conflict, which she says is more than antagonists and obstacles. “Conflict is a tapestry woven from multiple aspects of writing that all work together to create the fear that victory will not come easily to the characters, and it leaves readers dying to know what the protagonist is going to do about it,” she says.
Hardy pinpoints three common mistakes:
- We think conflict is what’s in the way—literally. Obstacles can create conflict, but usually, they are just obstacles. “Obstacles only delay what was going to happen anyway—they don’t force a choice or make the outcome uncertain,” Hardy explains. A traffic jam is an obstacle, but a traffic jam that causes your hero to lose his job is an inciting incident.
- We don’t understand what people mean when they say “conflict.” Conflict means different things to different people. A writer who focuses on internal conflict may find little struggle in a novel that’s heavy on plot, and vice versa. Writers of thrillers and romances have different concepts of the kind of conflicts that work in their stories. Understanding context is especially important when asking for feedback.
- We’re using the wrong (or no) conflict to write our novel. Internal conflict is central to many contemporary novels, but it’s hard to create a plot around it. “An internal conflict works wonderfully to support a character arc, but internal conflicts don’t create plot—they just make it emotionally harder to overcome the external challenges,” Hardy explains. “It’s what the character physically does to resolve that internal conflict that creates the plot.” Character-driven stories need external goals and conflict that reflect the interior life of the main character. “If they can’t commit, force them into situations where they need to do so to win,” Hardy writes. “If they’re scared of speaking out, put them in a scene where they have to defend someone they care about.”
